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What is the vocation?

The vocation of consecrated

The entrance itself in the consecrated life is a greater good, and those who question this, says St. Thomas, "contradicts Christ" ( Christo derogat ) that made ​​the subject of an evangelical counsel. In another part of the same Angelic Doctor teaches, which is "to revile Christ" ( Christo iniuriam facit ) did not realize that the consecrated vocation is a greater good. Therefore, says Saint John Bosco: "The religious state is a state of sublime and truly angelic. Those who out of love for God and for their eternal salvation feel in their hearts the desire to embrace this state of perfection and holiness, they may believe, without any doubt, that this desire comes from heaven , because it is too generous and is far above the feelings of nature. "

Christ continues to call

The call of God is ordinarily within. It is God who inspires the souls from within the desire to embrace a state so high and lofty as the consecrated life. The inner desire and disinterested to embrace the religious state is an authentic divine call, because it is a desire that exceeds nature, and must be followed instantly, today as yesterday applies the words of Jesus in the Scriptures.
The advice if you want to be perfect, go ', sell what you possess and give to the poor (Mt 19, 21) addressed the Christ to all men of every time and place: everyone who has left houses or brothers ... for my name, receive a hundredfold and will inherit eternal life (Mt 19:21 ff.). So everyone, even today, are receiving this advice as if you listen to the Lord's own lips. And anyone who decides thanks to this advice can legitimately think that it has received authentic religious vocation.

"Having heard - says about St. Jerome - the judgment of the Savior if you want to be perfect, 'Sell everything you have and give to the poor and then come follow me: translate these words into works and following the Cross naked naked thou shalt come up with more readiness Jacob's Ladder ".

This advice that Christ has given, it is a divine advice for everyone. And what I say unto you I say unto all, Watch (Mk 13, 37) told the crowd, because everything which was written before us, was written for our instruction (Rom. 15: 4). It is a mistake to think that these things have had value only in their time (cf. Heb 12: 5). "If all these things had been preached only to his contemporaries, never would have written. So were preached to them and written for us ".
The inner call is authentic call of God and must be obeyed instantly, as if we listened to the voice of the Lord.

What are the signs of a true vocation?

A feature of the divine call is to push men to higher things. Therefore the desire of religious life, because it is so sublime and elevated, it can never come from the devil or from the meat. Says Sant 'Agostino: "something very alien under the meat is this school in which the Father is heard, and teaches the way to get to the Son. And this is not the work through the ears of the flesh, but through those of the heart". At this St. Thomas adds: "We must obey without falter for a moment and for any reason without resisting the inner voices with which the Holy Spirit moves the soul", the Lord God has opened my ear, and I'm not opposed resistance, I have not turned back (Is 50, 5), remembering that all those who are governed by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God because they are the "right by the impulse of grace." Keep in mind the advice of St. Paul also walk by the Spirit (Gal 5: 25) and be men of supernatural principles that are led only by the spirit of Jesus Christ, who is the Holy Spirit, realizing his call promptly. We should not complain as did St. Augustine "already convinced of the truth, I had absolutely nothing to answer, only a few words languid and sleepy: 'after yes, after': and let a little ' you was already too long ... I very ashamed because I felt the murmur of that nonsense (worldly and carnal) that made ​​me undecided ".

Hazards where there is a consecrated vocation

Don Bosco himself warned that "the one who is consecrated to God by the holy vows makes a deal more precious and pleasing to His Divine Majesty. But the enemy of our soul, realizing that by this means a person is emancipated from its domain, normally disturbs his mind with a thousand tricks to overcome it and throw it back in the winding paths of the world. The chief of these deceptions is to suscitargli doubts about vocation, which are followed by discouragement, apathy, often returning to the world that so often had recognized traitor and that, for the love of Jesus Christ had abandoned ". The devil knows that a soul totally dedicated to God is a lost soul for him, and will try by all means of inquietarla with doubts her away from the path of the sky.

Vocation is a gift of God to man and freely "stands for nature in the plan of the mystery", is a mystery of faith and love. So taught our Lord Jesus Christ: Pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest (cf. Mt 9, 38, Luke 10: 2). "Every vocation is an unrepeatable act of God".